Ross Droplet Technique for brewing coffee

“Dust comes out of the grinder; it’s like a plume that covers everything,” explained study coauthor Christopher Hendon, an associate professor of computational materials chemistry at the University of Oregon. “But if you add a little water, it seems not to go everywhere. It’s cleaner.”

While Hendon and his colleagues were looking for ways to keep the grinder and its surroundings clean, they noticed that adding a small amount of water into the grinder—also known as the Ross droplet technique—also has an effect on the grinding process.